Election

1999 comedy

Rating: 11/20

Plot: High schooler Tracy Flick is running for student body president. Things look good since there's nobody running against her. Popular history teacher Mr. McAllister, student council sponsor, dislikes her, however, partially because she's that annoying overachieving type and partially because she was involved in a scandal that got his best friend and colleague fired. So, he encourages Paul, school sports hero, to run against her. Things don't go according to plan.

There's a terrific first shot--a close-up of a sprinkler oversaturating a football field. Then, we meet the teacher, and as a teacher, I recognized some of his morning, most notably the refrigerator that he decides needs cleaned out. A janitor gives him the evil eye which made me smile. Not a bad start, I thought! From there, unfortunately, it's all downhill. Immediately, I jotted down that I hated the duo-narrators, but then it turned into three narrators. Then, it turned into four narrators! Later on, I decided to start narrating myself.

"I looked at the clock again, wondering to myself why I couldn't care less about the outcome of this election."

"I wondered to myself why Mr. McAllister had a problem with Paul's sister deciding to run for president since it looked like she might win which would get him precisely what he wanted."

"I thought about earlier scenes, trying to find a reason why Tracy would know that Mr. M and his wife were having trouble conceiving while nobody in the school seemed to know that she had had sex with a teacher."

All four narrators are that naive, unreliable type, frequently telling the audience things that differed from what was seen on the screen, and I couldn't figure out which of the characters I was supposed to connect with and root for. The football player is the most likable of the bunch, but he's way too stupid to actually like, almost like he's working hard to search for his inner-Keanu. And the guy who plays him, Chris Klein, is terrible, also like he's working hard to search for his inner-Keanu. Reese Witherspoon isn't horrible, but her character is completely distasteful. I wanted to punch her through my television screen. She also pronounces illegible wrong. The football player's sister? She added very little to the story, almost to the point where she didn't need to be in the movie at all. And Matthew Broderick's Mr. M didn't make sense at all to me, a character full of illogical contradictions. This is the type of movie that addresses some controversial issues like inappropriate teacher/student relations, adolescent lesbianism, infidelity, and teen depression, each with an annoying lack of depth. That wouldn't be a problem, but none of it is particularly funny. Along the way, things get gimmicky. There's a fantasy sequence near the middle that is just jarring, there's a sort of screeching theme music used for Tracy's character that is just grating, there's some archival footage of New York City that is just anachronistic, there are some weird camera angles (during a sex scene, a crying scene, and a ludicrous praying scene) that were just amateurish, and there's a bookend gimmick that just makes the ending (part of it anyway) predictable. At least there was a Donovan song in there somewhere. Out of all the characters, the one I came the closest to liking was the principal whose chastising of some rowdy students during the presidential candidates' speeches was the funniest part of the movie. However, not even that could draw a chortle from me.

Main thing I learned from this movie: young lesbians enjoy swing sets.

Sorry, Cory.